Who can download GEDCOMs from Ancestry.com member Trees?

Re: Who can download GEDCOMs from Ancestry.com member Trees?

elhan00, that woman is the epitome of this slippery slope. Her tree isn't researched at all--it's copied from everyone else. She doesn't change image titles so her media includes dozens of bogus "relatives" with different surnames. Three other users and I have complained to Ancestry and were told they couldn't do anything.

My tree is now private after she downloaded 100+ records in two days. She basically duplicated my index but the info was out there for a short time. Unfortunately, she later posted a personal story about my grandmother that includes names of living people. I had shared it by email with a "cousin" who accidentally posted it for one day. He removed it the minute I asked, but it was already too late because this woman was stripping his tree on that day.

Since it was my own story, I sent her a polite message asking her to replace the file with the public copy I posted on Find a Grave--I gave her the link and even offered to email the PDF. I think you'll find her reply [copied and pasted] interesting:

"...So three living people were mentioned..,.so what? Nothing bad was said about them. I haven't time to correct mistakes people or Ancestry makes. When I find a piece of the puzzle of our ancestry I put it on my page.I'm recording history, not creating it. If the info was out and out wrong I would not put it on but just because someone is alive is not enough reason for me to keep it out of a human interest story. Have noticed Ancestry slips up on adhering to members wishes on privacy.Slip-ups happen." [End quote.]_____

Despite her reference to "our" ancestry, she is in NO way related to me or the other three researchers I mentioned. I didn't even ask her to remove the story, just to replace it without the private info, but she has also refused requests from others to remove data that IS out and out wrong. It's hard to imagine what her motive is, but I literally can't search any more without her "tree" coming up in the results.

Researchers have been incredibly generous to me for many years and if someone has a legitimate connection to my family, I always share what I have, including a GEDCOM. But after my experience with this vulture, I share everything via email and agree that permission should be granted to download GEDCOMs.

I know some of you will strongly disagree with me (and obviously I feel this woman is intentionally invading privacy), but remember that tons of misinformation is being spread like wildfire by people like her. That's bad for genealogy and damaging to those of us who try to research accurately--at the very least, we've all lost countless hours running down bad leads.